Thursday, October 11, 2012

the wilds of Africa

I've made it to the mine site!

Now, I'm sure everyone wants to hear all about that, but sadly for you, I'm not totally prepared to write about that yet.  I've had a short tour of the site, but - being the workaholic I am - I have mostly seen the inside of my bedroom and the inside of my office, the conference room, the board room, my other office, and our soon-to-be-office-building (that's right, I've got a BUILDING. oh, and okay, it's not just mine... I share with Vitaliy.)

So, of course, there's the trip to the site, which was incredibly early, but also incredibly beautiful.  There's the tour and my first impressions to get to.  There are the things I hope to do on my trip and the hardships I've noticed (really, painfully bad internet connections - I am sorry not to have sent more emails in the past few days).  So much to talk about... but mostly...

THERE ARE ANIMALS.

For an industrial production site, this place is crawling with wildlife.  The landscaping is incredible, the sky is clear, everything is clean.  And there are animals everywhere - tiny little yellow birds that make nests on light tree limbs to keep their young safe from snakes, giant ugly maribou storks that skulk around the site all day, lizards and centipedes with shells like rolly polly bugs from home.  And those are just the ones you see every day!  Then there are packs of mongoose, which have stripes like zebra but act like prairie dogs.  I've also seen small groups of dick dicks, like miniature deer.  And silver foxes, running away like mists in the night.  My favorite though - BESIDES THE MONKEYS - were the peacocks that were outside my front doorway yesterday.  A whole flock of them.  They are solid too, like turkeys, and did you know that they fly?  Amazing.

But the worst news is that I'm awful at taking photos.  Truly.  I have a lot of pictures where you can't tell there's an animal in it at all.  And I have a number of others of blurs peeling off the edge of the frame, where the silly little thing is running away.  I am trying, I promise, but it's just so tough when these things don't sit still.  Crazy, wild Africa.

2 comments:

  1. Wow .. just had a chance to read about the adventure since you were getting ready to go ! and you look GOOD in that hat ! It all truly sounds wonderful and exciting !!! Take pictures, I am sure we will figure out the animals from the buildings .. maybe !

    Miss your smiling face ... I smiled when i say the picture

    Love from us both

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  2. I taught you about documentation, but apparently not how to document.... :) Happy to see you are attempting the camera (you've come along away in 5-7 years!) xoxo

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